Sony Open to Considering PS3 Price Cuts 339
njkid1 writes with word that Sony is considering dropping the PS3's price. The Mercury news reports that Sony Senior Vice President Takao Yuhara has admitted they are investigating whether to drop the PlayStation 3 in price around the world, despite statements previously made that the 'lower' PS3 price in Japan is hurting Sony's bottom line. Profits for the company slipped some five percent in the October-December period, and the shortfall expected through March could be even worse than previously predicted. The article points out the possibly risky nature of a price cut for such an expensive item so early in its lifespan, and notes the stiff competition from the Xbox 360 and the Wii.
That's nice... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sony is Going to Lose the Console War (Score:5, Insightful)
Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone else betting that Sony learns nothing from this?
They seriously need to figure out that, when someone buys a game system, we want to PLAY GAMES ON IT. We don't need to watch movies, listen to MP3s, view images, surf the web, do our dishes, and drive to work using the same machine.
Enough! (Score:5, Insightful)
That is at least until the (unlikely) event that the non-fanboi consumer starts getting interested in Sony's nexgen child.
20GB Model (Score:3, Insightful)
Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Now they have to drop prices and quickly.
Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
And then consumers whined. "They cost too much"
and then Sony said, "But you told us you wanted those features when we asked you about them so we put them in there. You had to know that would raise the price."
Consumers: "Waaaah it costs too much we just want to play puzzle games and casual games"
Sony: "But you said you wanted games that were more like those you played at home on your portables. You wanted 3D games rather than stripped down 2D travesties of 3D games like what happened on the Gameboy Color ports of 3D games.
You said you wanted higher resolutions on your home machines like you have on PC's. You wanted built in wireless so you wouldn't have to buy a wireless bridge, you wanted us to use standard memory cards. and now you complain about having to buy an HDTV, having to pay for the built in wireless, and having to pay for an adapter for the old cards? You people are hypocrites and don't know what you want."
Here's what Sony needs to learn:
Consumers don't know what they want, will whine anyway when they get what they said they wanted, and sometimes lie
Re:20GB Model (Score:4, Insightful)
Millionares think 900,000 dollars for a home is a great deal, whereas mr. and mrs. joe shmo can think 500 bucks a month for a one room apartment is a great deal.
Unless you have a burning desire to have blu-ray in your home, there really is no good reason beyond a personal opinion to spend 600 dollars on a PS3. the 360 has the same graphics (in some cases, better) and still uses "old" dual-layer dvd technology.
Had sony stayed out of the media market (which they have failed in time after time after time) and just stuck with what works, they would be in a much better position.
Not selling hurts more (Score:3, Insightful)
the 'lower' PS3 price in Japan is hurting Sony's bottom line
NOT selling a PS3 hurts the bottom line even more.
Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
And then consumers whined. "They cost too much"
and then Sony said, "But you told us you wanted those features when we asked you about them so we put them in there. You had to know that would raise the price."
Re:better to lose a little on the sale (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Yet another stupid move on Sony's part. They were better off continuing to deny that a price drop was even being discussed, and then picking a random day and just lowering the price.
I certainly wouldn't buy a $600 console knowing that the price could be $500 in a month or two.
That's a free second controller and a game....
Which is the other way they could go, I guess... Bundle a second sixaxis and resistance:fall of man with every 60GB unit for the same price.
Re:better to lose a little on the sale (Score:3, Insightful)
The Wii price point was marginal despite the interesting input devices, oddly enough it was the price of the competition that caused me to view it in a favorable light and purchase one. The Xbox 360 price was out of line IMO, although it can no doubt come down over time. The PS3 at this point is a ridiculous joke. The 360 going down in price might find me purchasing one, but I'm not sure if Sony can make back through licensing what they're likely to lose on the PS3 with further price cuts. If they can bring it to around $200, I might buy one. I don't see it happening within the next few years.
Computers and their components become faster over time, and the price for components generally goes down when they have been in production for some time. Ideally, a console would consist of parts which are favorable to reasonably priced mass production while providing good performance. Sony has thrown balance out the window and attempted to make the most powerful console. This sounds nice in theory, but they're using parts that are difficult to manufacture, expensive, and unproven (in the case of Cell.) Passing the costs on to consumers obviously doesn't work in this case, but how much of the cost can Sony eat? What if someone gets one and uses it as e.g. a Linux box without playing games on it? They may never receive software licensing revenue for that unit, so each instance is a net loss.
they aren't Coke (Score:5, Insightful)
Take Coke. We were told by the company that their newest was the greatest shit on earth and all other colas might as well pack it in. They even took away Coke. The Coke we all knew and loved. A Coke that all they had to do was not fuck it up.
And they fucked it up.
And there was outrage. More importantly, there were no sales of this New Coke. Yet people as I recall were selling two liters of old, or Classic Coke for hundreds of dollars.
And they saw this outrage and maybe cared, maybe not. But they saw the sales in those markets. And their New Coke had a short, painful life, and a quiet death. I don't even know if they promoted when the sliver stripe on the cans disappeared and Classic Coke was just Coke again.
Because they could. Because THEIR product does not have to evolve and is unique within their domain. They were smart enough, God help me, to realize that they had a great product in their domain, and their customers were willing to fight for it; all they had to do is not fuck it up.
THEY could say they fucked up, go back to the Classic taste we all loved, and sure, even drop the price if they wanted to to sweeten the deal a little, slight pun intended. And we would forgive them because they made us whole, we had our Coke again and the world was right.
Their product allowed for a fuck up of such massive proportions. A gig in management there must be sweet.
Sony assumes that the BRANDNAME "Playstation" carries all the attributes of a Classic Coke. No. Their product does have to evolve and becomes less and less unique by the day. They cannot just apologize, with their tails between their legs go back to what they had, drop the price a little, and make us all whole and happy with their product again.
Sony must make their "New Coke" fly.....and now they must try to repair the injury to their fans and make them whole again. A price drop alone cannot accomplish this, I wonder if anything they do really can. I wish them luck but I'm betting this will be another how not to succeed example in business classes across the globe in a few years.
A matter of timing (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:PS 3 sales prediction cut by 25% (Score:2, Insightful)
While these numbers indicate that the PS3's sales are below expectation, there is another interesting interpretation. Microsoft had sold 10 million Xbox 360's by the end of 2006. If Sony genuinely sells 4.5 million by end of March, they will have almost half the user base of the 360. Given all the doomcasting we've been hearing, that is not actually that bad a place to be after only three months in the market.
(And yes, yes, Microsoft is also selling 360's during the same period, but while sales may have been steady, I can't imagine they were flying off the shelves in a January when there were two shiny competitors on the market.)
Re:Bitterness (Score:3, Insightful)
They've set themselves up for it... (Score:4, Insightful)
Devs are comfortable on their competitors' machines - The Wii is just a faster gamecube (literally) with a neat controller, and while the 360 is relatively complex they've got wonderful top-notch tools to support development and an architecture thats doesn't have a split memory model or hobbled assymetric CPU.
Despite the high price, they're loosing about $175 - $225 per unit (depending on the model) while their competotors' machines are already profitable hardware. Nintendo has never sold an unprofitable machine, and right now, Microsoft could give consumers a $50 price drop and take each new owner out to lunch before they would go back into the red.
Mark my words -- If the earth doesn't shake for Sony real soon they'll be a distant third this time around, and may be foreced to drop from the race early or even for good, and if Sony's game division fails its going to make a huge hit on the entire company's bottom line.
They're arrogant over an overpriced architecture that hurts more than it helps, all in the name of pushing their BluRay format.
Re:Well... (Score:5, Insightful)
No one gets it yet. (Score:5, Insightful)
Like GM is to the US, Sony is the poster child of Japan's industrial growth -- and in ten years
they will be in a desperate struggle for survival.
Think that's too grim?
Watch.
Re:Not selling hurts more (Score:3, Insightful)
The tried too hard with this one. (Score:2, Insightful)
Just give me a game machine that plays games and doesn't rival my car in sticker price.
Re:That's nice... (Score:2, Insightful)
Not that it's really a "high-end computer" with merely 256MB of RAM which cannot be upgraded, but I digress.
I will never buy another Sony product... (Score:2, Insightful)
Sheep we are apparently.
Re:Not selling hurts more (Score:3, Insightful)
Right now, somewhere in Sony of America an executive is talking to a third party publisher and is trying to respond to the threat "If the PS3 doesn't start to sell more software we won't release any exclusive games for it!"
As dumb as Sony is they still know that EA, Activision, Ubisoft, Konami, Namco, and Square-Enix had a far greater impact on creating the Playstation brand than Sony ever did; I'm certain that every major third party developer has talked to Sony and brought up the poor sales of their products, the poor sales of the PS3 and the rumored lack of demand for the PS3 and is wondering why they should continue to spend $5,000,000-$10,000,000 per year to continue developing a game exclusively for the PS3. A price drop would be Sony's way of giving into the developers to ensure that they still had exclusive content that the XBox 360 didn't have.
Re:That's nice... (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm smiling... (Score:2, Insightful)
Sony is the only company I can think of off the top of my head in which I feel personal glee and satisfaction whenever their "next best thing" in (pick your area of entertainment) flops.
From the times I've been burned by their customer service, to the times in which I've watched others get burned - I find that I am honestly amazed that these morons even run a profit.
Re:Bitterness (Score:1, Insightful)
Nintendo and Microsoft have done some terrible things, but nothing you mention has anything to do with either company. The funny one to me is "Entered into contracts with Sony and Philips, later to break the contract (resulting in the Playstation brand)" mainly because Sony demanded that they would be able to get 100% of the Hardware revinues and 50% of the software royalties for the SNES CD and Nintendo (correctly) refused. I know when you hit the 2 week point in a new job and your boss demands to fuck your ass you bend over, and then lick off his knob, but most people would walk out.
This reminds me of something... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:That's nice... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I'm smiling... (Score:3, Insightful)